Patient Testimonials and Reviews

Dear Dr. Silva,

I wanted to write to you to thank you for saving my wife, Veronica.

For the past three years plus she has been on the couch. She had no energy, not even to eat during the day. Her hair was falling out in clumps. She would sleep for forteen hours or more every day. She had no strength. She couldn’t even take a shower or wash her hair by herself. She was always pale with dull eyes.

I truly was afraid that she would just fade away. She is only 56.

We tried to get my doctor to help her but the HMO system or his ignorance would not let him treat her in any helpful way. They even referred her to the endocronologist. He said her thyroid levels were in the normal range.

I went on the internet looking for help. I came upon your website and was encouraged by what I saw. We were both hopeful when we left after our first visit with you. You understood what she had been through and you cared. You weren’t cold and clinical. You conservatively said what we could expect as Veronica started on your treatment plan. We were amazed and so thankful for her rapid improvement.

After only 2 months of following your care and using the thyroid and hormones and vitamins that you prescribed, Veronica came back from the dead! She was able to wake up. She had a little energy. She could walk better. The light was comming back in her eyes. Her hair was getting back some shine and wasn’t falling out so bad.

At 4 months Veronica is so much better. She sleeps about 9 or 10 hrs (always has) and can wake up quickly and can get dressed and brush her own hair. Her strength is almost all back. She has been outside. We even had our first yoga class together. She lasted all 90 minutes!!

I can’t thank you enough. I love my wife and look forward to many years with her and you as her doctor and advisor.

Sincerely,jim hart

It started slowly.

Around the age of forty-four I started to change. My sense of optimism and joy in life began to ebb. My social calendar dwindled away as I refused invitation after invitation with an uncharacteristic sense of disinterest.

The biggest loss was my lifelong passion for the culinary arts. For most of my life I’d been an avid baker and devoted student of every aspect of food and cooking. When I stopped wanting to even read about cooking, I could see that something was deeply out of order, but couldn’t put my finger on it.

As I continued to suffer the changes, my confidence and self-esteem began to wane. I was trying to figure out, what was wrong with me? My internal mood became darker and I experienced disproportionate reactivity to life’s daily nuisances with stronger and stronger bursts of anger. This was not typical for me!

Lifelong my nicknames have been “Sunny”, “Smiley”, “Bunny” and I was feeling more like “Grouchy”, “Grumpy” and quite often just plain old “Bitchy”. In the past I’d experienced a brief episode of depression based on an avalanche of personal losses and I thought maybe my distress was chemical? So I started taking a low dose of Zoloft that was mildly helpful – I was no longer raging about everything – but my joy in living was still missing.

Then more changes. Night sweats, hot flashes, fatigue and a complete loss of libido kicked in. Well by then, the mystery was solved. My suffering was related to the “change” of menopause. And based mostly on my politics, fears of breast cancer (what woman isn’t?) and serious mistrust of pharmaceutical companies, I decided that taking synthetic hormones wasn’t a great option. Besides, my medical plan wasn’t covering anything at all. So I just continued to suffer. (As did my husband who had taken to announcing that he would gladly put me out of my misery but the police would immediately assume he was the number one suspect.)

The changes continued. I started to gain weight. Twenty pounds. My clothes didn’t fit and no matter how much cardio exercise I did, the scale didn’t budge. Then, to my horror, it went up. I weighed more than I’d ever weighed in my life and nothing I did touched it.

While gaining weight was painful and embarrassing and all the other things that weight is not supposed to mean but does, it wasn’t the final straw for me.

I stopped sleeping.

All my life I’ve been a great sleeper. One of those head hits the pillow, sound asleep and then wake up completely refreshed seven or eight hours later, ready to take on the world. I was a morning person and stayed up all day long and didn’t need a long nap every day just to stay awake through dinner. I knew from my training as a psychotherapist that sleep depravation is considered a form of torture for its power to disturb the human psyche.

My suffering continued.

The light at the end of the tunnel turned out to be my dearest friend who had started taking bio-identical hormones about six months earlier and reported her symptoms had abated significantly. Why didn’t I try them?

When I stopped sleeping, that was the final straw. I went online and found a reputable physician who offered bio-identical compounds. and underwent the testing. After my initial assessment and formulation, I started taking the hormones. Within three weeks, the changes finally started to go my way.

I’m not the type to say this is a miracle cure, but for goodness sake – I can sleep! My friends have commented “it’s so good to see the real you again”. And I have to agree, it’s great to BE the real me again. I missed my energy, enthusiasm for life and most of all my sense of humor!

My personal experience has been life altering. I’m fifty-four and the weight loss remains a challenge, but the hot flashes, night sweats and extreme irritability are almost completely gone. My libido has returned and I’m laughing again, cooking, enjoying my life and finding the creative energy to stay engaged with new friends and new projects.

It took me ten years to get through my mid-life passage and I only regret not finding relief earlier.

Barbara Zelnick

Hello Dr. Silva,

Thank you for helping me.
Before I came to see you my emotions were all over the place. I didnt know what to do about them. I felt out of control of my own emotions. I knew I was being unreasonable and difficult but I couldn’t stop myself. Even the slightest thing would make me annoyed, angry and even aggressive. I had also been trying to lose weight with every diet and weight loss program you could imagine.

I tried weight watchers, which used to work for me, I tried the LA weight loss clinic, over $1000. The Vitamin B6 shots. I tried Nutisystem which cost me $300 for 1 month, the food was horrible. However I could not lose weight, no matter what I did. I even went to the gym for 2 hours, 5 days a week and still the weight would not budge. I was too scared to stop going because I figured I would just pile on more weight if I stopped. I am a very determined person so this frustrated me, because I wanted to look and feel good. Then one month my period started and lasted over 2 months, then I read a book about Bioidentical hormones and found you. I visited you and told you everything, you absolutely changed my life. You reviewed my blood and saliva tests and gave me prescriptions for progesterone, thyroid medication, DHEA, and a couple of other things. My bleeding stopped and I could not believe the difference in how I felt.
I felt like myself again. I was happy to get up each morning. I was not irritable or aggressive any more. I hardly ever have migraines now, before I would get them every month for about 3 days before my period. I feel calm and in control of my feelings now. And the best thing was I started losing weight too. I was 192lbs and at only 5 feet 2. that was very heavy a size 14/16. I lost about 35lbs in 8 months. Then it stalled but I heard about The HCG diet and asked you about it, you put me on that program, I have lost another16lbs on the HCG. I am now 141 lbs and very happy. I am now a size 6 or 8. At age 53 thats pretty good, especially having 4 children and 3 grandchildren am amazed at the results i git from the hormones and the HCG. And to think I didn’t come because I was concerned about the cost of it. It has changed my life completely and you can’t put a price on looking and feeling great. I spent so much money on the wrong things to try to make myself feel better. Diets and clothes but I still felt miserable. Now I feel at least 10 years younger, I have more energy and I am so much happier.

Thanks Sue Holt

I had been feeling more and more run down, lacking in energy, and unable to get myself started to do much of anything. First, this applies physically. In the past I had been into regular weight-training exercise, but that had tapered off as I didn’t have the strength or energy anymore. I had to get myself hyped-up on caffeine and sugar to get through even a moderate workout. So I gave up on weights and earlier this year decided to focus on jogging. I’d go jogging after work, but around mid-summer lost even that ability. By the time I got home I would feel destroyed, like I couldn’t do anything. Sometimes I would force myself to run and would have a slow, plodding, un-enjoyable run (which occasionally got cut short when I ran out of gas). I also had trouble sleeping about this time, and would feel tired all day but still unable to sleep. Beyond the physical effects, I was feeling worse in general. I couldn’t work up the energy or motivation to go anywhere or do anything. From now on would my life consist of going to work and collapsing in front of the TV? I was disappointed in myself for not doing more but doing anything was so hard. In general I felt fragile, nervous, and increasingly isolated.

The therapy is simple, one injection a week and a couple of pills. The first time I gave myself an injection was difficult because of the psychological barrier to sticking myself. I would put the needle against the skin, push harder and harder, and then lose my nerve and back away before I had broken through. Then I moved to another spot and tried again. Eventually I succeeded and there was virtually no pain, the discomfort was almost all from the expectation. I’ve done five injections so far, and it’s still not easy, but I can do it on the first try now. The first couple of days after the first injection I woke up with a headache, which went away by mid-morning. And I had a headache the first morning after the second injection, but they’ve gone away completely since then.

The effects have been noticeable. Instead of always feeling irritable and uneasy I feel calm and self-assured. The energy, motivation and stamina have come back. I’ve gone running almost every day after work for the last couple of weeks. I’ve even started lifting weights again. And in the morning before work, no less (after work is for running). I wouldn’t say I feel like a superman or hyped-up. I just don’t feel worn out. If there’s something I want to do, I can do it rather than be stopped because my body just won’t move. Earlier this month I finally flew to Oregon to go windsurfing on the Columbia River for a few days, like I had been meaning to do for years. I feel generally more motivated and engaged in life. My sleep is fine now. I’m even eating much better. With the workouts and activity a lot of the cravings for sugar and treats have diminished, instead I like good food and in moderate amounts. I feel like I’ve gone from a downward spiral to an upward spiral. So overall, the treatment has been a big success for me.